MAP09: Forlorn Fortress (Eternal Doom)

MAP09: Forlorn Fortress is the ninth level of Eternal Doom and was designed by Chris Couleur. A (vastly) expanded version of the map was later included in Eternal Doom IV as.

Quick tips

 * When you climb the ladder out of the water to what appears to be a dead end (with three torches), press one of the walls behind you for a teleporter.
 * You will reach another apparent dead end on a balcony area later on. There are three skull-textured walls behind you. Again, one can be pressed for a teleporter.
 * In the large area beyond the yellow door(s), the southwestern-most of the four small rooms accessed off the main hallway(s) has an 'X' switch you must press. After you hit this 'X' there will be a short series of switches/teleports you must find in the hallways themselves.

Essentials
Enter the castle. Inside, to the west of the entrance, there is a face stone. Push it, enter the hole to the right, an elevator will bring you to a small platform, find the blue key here.

Go up the wide staircase, enter the blue door, go through the only other non-keyed door. Go up the stairs that will split but lead to the same gallery. Enter the door at the other end, try to push the figures, one of them will open. Go through and to the room before the balcony. Activate the face stone. Go back and through the second figure that has just opened. At the end of the hallway, there is another face stone to push, opening the remaining third figure. Behind it, follow the stairs to the top gallery. Jump down into the area with the river. Jump down into the room the river is running into. Climb the ladder into a small room with torches. One of the walls can be opened, revealing a teleporter that will bring you back to the bottom gallery. Go down one of the stairs to the point where they re-unite. You can now go up between them and pick up the red key.

Enter the red door (to the right/east of the blue door), you will reach another door, behind which stairs lead up to a room with fireplace and bookshelves. Go down the stairs at the eastern side of the room (not all the way to the river) and activate the red skull stone. Go back up, one of the bookshelves has opened, so you can reach a balcony with three green face stones. Push these stones, one of them will reveal a teleporter. Use it, at the destination is another teleporter to bring you back later. But first, go down the stairs, go through the door and onto the eastern balcony where the yellow key is awaiting you.

The red and blue door's hallway has yellow doors at both ends. Go through any of them, you will reach the big open courtyard in the north-west. From the surrounding hallway, four tiny balconies are accessible. In the small room leading to the south-west balcony, there is a hard to see 'X' switch on one of the bricks. When you hit it, the backside of a pillar (at the nearby top of the stairs) will open. Inside are a Hell knight and a face stone switch. Hit the switch and head to the opposite (eastern) side of the courtyard where the equivalent pillar has opened. Inside are an arch-vile and a teleporter. Enter the teleport to be teleported into the tower in the middle of the open area. Enter the round table room in the tower's center. Hit the slit eye switch. A stained glass window in the vicinity of the teleporter pillar will be smashed (by barons from the other side). This leads into a small courtyard with a soul sphere which you might have seen through windows while playing through the level. Above is an arachnotron. Jump through (possibly catching the supercharge) and defeat a baron of Hell. There is no escape from here but the door leading to the exit teleporter to the next level.

Secrets

 * 1) The only official secret is the start room, which registers immediately. (sector 1)

Bugs
The two yellow key doors have single-fire walkover trigger lines on the courtyard's side. Until spent, these block use from this direction, so opening one door and trying to open the other from the courtyard side will fail. This is made much worse by the fact that the linedef can be skipped at the western door, preventing both doors from being opened again should this occur.

There are a couple of noticeable node builder errors:
 * The interior stairs leading to the northeast section with the fireplace terminates in a spot where the player and monsters will sink one step into the ground.
 * Inside the circular building in the north is a blocking invisible wall to the left of the eye button.

Current records
The records for the map at the Doom Speed Demo Archive are:

The data was last verified in its entirety on August 1, 2022.

Player spawns
This level contains four spawn points:
 * 1) facing north. (thing 494)
 * 2) facing south. (thing 495)
 * 3) facing west. (thing 496)
 * 4) facing east. (thing 497)

Things
This level contains the following numbers of things per skill level: